Page 74 of Thin Ice

"I'm safe. His mom is — she gave me a house key for Christmas."

He made a sound that wasn't a laugh. More like air leaving.

"Tell me what happened," he said. "All of it. I've got time."

I told him everything. From the very beginning — the first time I met Liam, all the way through the semester, the blackmail, winning the Charles, my father disowning me. We were on the phone for over 40 minutes just explaining the wreck that my life was. But I had Liam.

He listened without interrupting. Once I heard him get up and close a door, and when he came back his voice was different. Closer. Like he'd moved to a room where nobody else could hear.

"That crack you saw," he said when I finished. "The half-second where he almost said your name."

"Yeah."

"I saw it too. Thanksgiving. Right after I introduced David. My dad was standing in the foyer and his face did this thing for about a second where he looked like a person who loved his son, and then it closed and he spent the next forty-five minutes making phone calls and by dinner I didn't have a trust fund."

"Forty-five minutes?"

"Forty-five minutes. I timed it because I was sitting on the stairs listening to him call the bank, the attorney, the school. He did it in order, Alex. He had the numbers memorized. He had a plan for me failing to be who he wanted, and the plan was already loaded."

My stomach turned. My father had the plan loaded too. The folder with Caldwell's notation. December fourteenth. Before I even arrived.

"So what happened?" I said. "After."

"After was bad for a while. I moved to Portland because a friend from Yale was out here and said I could sleep on his couch. I slept on a couch for four months. Got a job at a food bank making nothing. David was still in New Haven, and we were doing long distance on a barista salary and it was — " He stopped. "It was the worst year of my life. Not because of the money, though the money was bad. Because I kept waking up and reaching for my phone thinking someone was going to call. My mom. Uncle Thomas. Anyone. Just to say we made a mistake, or we miss you, or even how are you. Nobody called. Not once. Six years and nobody has called."

"I'm sorry I never did."

"You're calling now. That counts."

He was quiet for a second.

"It gets better, Alex. I know that's the most useless thing anyone can say to you right now, and I'm saying it anyway because it's true. The first year is survival. The second year, you start to realize you're not just surviving, you're actually building something. David and I got an apartment. I got the job at Cascadia. I have friends who know me as James, not as a Harrington. I cook dinner. I go on hikes. It's a small life, and it's mine, and I wouldn't trade it for the big one."

"Even with — "

"The money doesn't matter as much as you think it does." A pause. "It's worth it. The freedom is worth it. I just wish I'd known that because at the time I thought I was dying."

My eyes were burning. I pressed my palm against them.

"Would you have changed anything?"

"I don't know." His voice caught. Just slightly. "My mom sent me a birthday card. Two years after. No return address, just my name and a card, and nothing written inside except thinking of you. And I never responded. And she never sent another one."

The room was quiet.

"I would have responded. See if my mom had changed her mind."

He went quiet. I could hear David's voice faintly through the door, asking if he wanted tea. James said yeah, and then he was back.

"Sorry."

"It's fine."

Through the wall, I could hear Liam laugh. The sound of dishes being stacked.

"Your mom," James said. "Catherine. Is she — "

"She's on his side… but I don't think she wants to be."